Yahoo IMAP server - Rejected Password

Well I have to say that since my last post on this subject (Aug) - It has been working constantly - totally 100%!!!

Not sure why , but it happened after I lost wi-fi connection on my IPad and had to re-enter all settings - coincidence?? Don't know but I am HAPPY ;o)

It seems like there are actually two separate issues with the same symptom. The second issue below is what most people are complaining about:

1. If you have the setting to check email very frequently; such as once a minute, sooner or later, you will start getting authenication prompts. Setting your pop3 email to once every 5 minute should work best. However, no matter what, you wont be able to avoid issue #2 below.

2. Yahoo's authentication servers become inaccessible. This would affect both POP3 and IMAP users since they both use the same servers to authenticate. When this problem happens, nobody can access their service. So, it doesnt matter what settings you change or what program or device you use. When it's down, it's down. This isn't something that will be fixed anytime; which is why so many people are abandoning yahoo as their primary email provider.

I have not had an issue with a rejected password for 5 months. There are a number of issues I addressed to correct the problem. As some in this forum have suspected it is only the main account tied to the DSL modem from AT&T that has the password rejection. I have 4 sbcglobal/Yahoo mail accounts, 2 gmail, 1 live.com all accessed through the mail app on both the iPad and iMac and a Win7 mini using the Live Mail client. The only account to have the password problem is the main account associated with the AT&T modem.

The SBC accounts on my iMac are set up as POP accounts as well as the gmail and have been for more than 10 years. On iPad 3 they are set up as IMAP except for the main account. The main account is now set up on the iPad as a POP account. It was originally IMAP and at that time I had rejected password problems.

When the rejected password problem surfaced I disabled the main account on my iPad as I had just added it so I suspected it may be causing the problem and it does. I left it disabled for a few months and the problem did not return. I could always go to Yahoo/SBCglobal mail site and get my mail on the main account from the iPad but that is not efficient. Four weeks ago I deleted the main account from my iPad and reinstalled it on the iPad as a POP account. Since then No problems with rejected password.

In the iPad I do not have push or fetch turned on so the only time it gets mail is when I access the mail app. I do not want to be interrupted every time a message comes in. The same is true on the iMac the mail app only gets mail when I press the Get Mail button. I believe as was previously stated that the high frequency access of mail from the Yahoo IMAP server may add to the rejected password problem. I just updated to iOS 6 and everything seems to work properly.

Yeah, the probem doesn't seem to affect casual yahoo pop mail users; and, people who poll the yahoo servers sparingly. It's a sure bet that eventually it will catch up with you on a desktop computer (mac or PC) that has an email client always open; which polls their servers less than <5 minute intervals. I used to also think I somehow "fixed" the problem after not seeing the problem for 6-7 months straight; then, I realized that it was because I had my polling interval was reset back to the email reader default; which was something like every 10 minutes instead of every two minutes after I had reinstalled Outlook. You can also search for this problem on google.com since it's not specific to apple users.

Hey Guys, this issue has been bugging me for a while now and I finally found out whats causing it... MOZILLA FIREFOX! I saw on another forum that firefox has some wierd proxy setting in it that messes with things. I put 2 and 2 together, and since I have switched to Chrome some time ago but never deleted Firefox, I was more than willing to give it a try. I deleted it last night and havn't had to enter my Yahoo password since! Give it a try!

The proxy settings in firefox are for http/https; which is only used for businesses with very strict firewalls, hotels; and, in some extremely rare cases ISPs for residential services, Otherwise, the proxy section of your web browser should just be disabled; having a straight connection to the outside world. As far as I know, there's no such thing as a pop3 mail reader that uses these types of https proxies (which are only meant for web browsers).

In other words, Firefox has nothing to do with your pop3 mail reader. The only way I can see even the slightest bit relation is if you login to yahoo's website using firefox; and, it somehow affecting athentication on your pop3 mail reader; which is a pretty far stretch. It never affected me one way or the other.

I agree it's very strange but it fixed the problem for me. Try it out and report back folks.

The rejected password on desktop mail is a security feature on Yahoo.

Yahoo will request to confirm your identity by logging in also to a web browser on each iOS device where the imap yahoo email is active.

Not sure if you need to use your home WiFi connection or not.

At times, the yahoo website will require additional confirmation.

I was able to reconfirm the solution with my iPhone5, but in the past I had some unexpected behaviors.

As far as I know, pop3 (or even SMTP) protocol don't have any way of revealing client type the way http/http do; so, it's not going to know whether it's an ipad, Outlook, Android, or even command-line. The only way it could treat a client any different is the settings used for pop3; such as polling frequency. I seriously doubt they can discriminate based on the available authentication parameters:

http://ftp.ics.uci.edu/pub/ietf/uri/rfc2384.txt

After playing around for a while with the keychain access and apple mail, i went back to my yahoo account on the web, and when i tried loging in, it asked me to change my password. And it wasn't a simple password change, they sent an authorization code to my phone as an SMS, and only after i entered that code online did my password change go through. Then, once with my new password, I entered it to apple mail, and the problem simply disappeared. How long will this fix last, i don't know, perhaps till yahoo makes me change my password again??

After playing around with Keychain in OSX you probably accessed your Yahoo account incorrectly multiple times and tripped the password verification switch. The new password will not prevent further rejected passwords. The solution is in the previous posts in this discussion.

Corsario I cannot find the 'fetch new data' is it in system preferences? Where are you finding the 'settings'? This is driving me crazy!

Go to system preferences / mail contacts calenders / fetch new data is there just under the accounts section.

Message was edited by: mick571

I just have a thing down the left hand side with my icloud, facebook and yahoo accounts with a + and - at the bottom and next to it on the right a scrolling thing with all the possible accounts like gmail, outlook, Aol etc... There doesn't seem to be any other tabs or options? I'm on the updated mountain lion? Sorry if I'm being really stupid!

I assume you are on a iphone or an iPad , go to settings,, scroll down to Mail, Contacts, Calenders, select that, then make sure you are scrolled to the top to see accounts, all your email accounts.. Under that section is Fetch new data, just above Mail.